Indian response to extradition request for murder accused awaited: Bangladesh

Bangladesh was keenly awaiting India's response to its request for extradition of multiple murder accused Nur Hossain, arrested in Kolkata over the weekend, Md. Shahriar Alam, minister of state for foreign affairs, said Tuesday.

Alam said Bangladesh had written to India in this regard and was awaiting a reply, bdnews24.com reported.

"We can only comment after India's official response," Alam said.

Hossain, who has been member of both the leading national parties in Bangladesh -- the Awami League (AL) and the Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP), was arrested June 14 in Kolkata and booked under Arms Act and Foreigners Act for illegal trespass into Indian territory without valid travel documents and for illegal possession of a weapon.

A councillor from Narayanganj, near Dhaka, Hossain is prime accused in a murder case where bodies of seven persons, including those of councillor Nazrul Islam and lawyer Chandan Kumar Sarkar, were found floating in the Shitalakkhya River in Narayanganj April 30.

Hossain is believed to be the mastermind of the Narayanganj multiple murders -- for which some officers of the Rapid Action Battalion or RAB, an elite anti-crime and anti-terrorism unit of the Bangladesh Police, are now in the dock -- and was absconding since then.

Hossain was Sunday presented by West Bengal Police in the district court in Barasat which sent him to police custody for eight days.